91Èȱ¬

1st!!!!!

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The stance by the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish FA's is nothing short of childish and pathetic. FIFA has clearly stated on several occasions that they would never force the 91Èȱ¬ Nations to form a GB team for international competitions. It is simply the fact that they don't want to play with the English.

Alot of peoples opinions would change if team GB got to the final

People in the UK don't seem to understand just how important Olympic football always is as a dress rehearsal for the next World Cup. Those eight under-23s will all be 24-25 when the World Cup comes around, and when you then add three older players you have a bona fide World Cup preview. The 1996 Brazil, for example, featured Roberto Carlos, Juninho, Rivaldo, Ronaldo and Bebeto. This time around the teams from Uruguay and Brazil in particular are virtually identical to the teams they will take to the World Cup.

All this user's posts have been removed.Why?

All this user's posts have been removed.Why?

#3
There is no shortage of fans in England who regularly state that that they don't trust anything coming from FIFA...but suddenly on this issue FIFA are to be trusted.

The SFA was one of the few associations to back the England WC bid and was the ONLY association to support the English FA stance during the re-election of Blatter. No one else supported you.

Far from respecting others right to take a different view on Team GB, you choose to have a pop at the Celtic associations on the basis of no credible evidence whatsoever..other than some petty prejudices of your own.

Ticket sales for the games at Hampden are shockingly low :) :)

#6 & 7 ChuubyPandas

I'd like England to take part in a 91Èȱ¬ Nations tournament. I think most of the fans would. But it's the suits at the FA who made the decision. With a bit of luck the "one-off" event in 2013 will show them how good it could be.

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Just watched the draw, now I know which games I'm seeing at Newcastle. Mexico v South Korea and Gabon v Switzerland on the Thursday; Spain v Honduras and Japan v Morocco on the Sunday. Hernández, Shaqiri, Xhaka, Mata, Muniain, Alcântara, Kagawa, Belhanda. Plenty of quality there.

cant wait to see the olympic football in the summer. got tickets to see team gb play and have found i also have tickets to see senegal play against uruguay which should be interesting

Stuart Pearce has got a very difficult job of cobbling together a squad from four football nations, which has to have a politically correct mix of players from all countries. They will never have played together before . The others are unknown quantities in that we do not know the strength of the squads they will send. If G B team fails badly it will reflect on his management, perhaps unfairly.

After three weeks of Euro football the public are likely to be satiated until next season which starts August 6th, five days before the Olympic final. NB will our clubs be depleted of their Olympic players?

#8 rob04

A fair point on the SFA backing the FA re: Blatter election, I had forgotten that. Tone of my first comment was probably wrong, but I still think the other 91Èȱ¬ Nations respective FA's have overreacted to what could be a great team. For example, there was an article I read where the Welsh FA said something along the lines of Gareth Bale "risked his reputation in the eyes of all Welsh football fans should he decide to take part in it". Really???

Having been at last nights game it was fairly obvious from the start who the winners were going to be, Senegal were seemingly 6 inches taller per man, a couple of stones heavier and quicker over any distance.
The quality of play shouldn't make any of the other teams fearful of what to expect though, the game was fairly exciting, but low on skill, even the weakest PL side would run rings around both of the teams on show.
The 11 and a half thousand who turned up isn't much of an indication about how many actually wanted to watch the game either, as about a third of those were school kids given tickets at prices comparable to penny chews, Wigan and Ali Al Habsi (with the help of the Omani FA) gave free travel and entry to a few coach loads of season ticket holders and from what I heard around me, there were many similar 'offers' too.

None of that should take away from the genuine excitement expressed by many of those who were there and just how much many people are looking forward to the Olympics as a whole and the football tournament in particular.

Having spent time in the Middles East where football is absolutely immense but with little international exploits the opportunity to represent your country on agolbal stage is taken with huge pride and passion, one that is lacking more and more in our 'serious' competitions. This is not an 'England' problem. This is modern day football where money overrules everything else. Even in South America, I would wonder the seriousness they would take the olympics if it wasnt for the opportunity to sign for a european club.

Fair enough Alex but I don't even think there was an over-reaction by the Celtic FA's. They were asked, they took their own advice from their reps within FIFA and were told not to touch Team GB with a bargepole because even their own FIFA insiders don't trust FIFA. And to be fair on the English FA, they haven't said anything disrespectful at all about the views of the other home nations: in other words, unlike some in the London media rent-a-quote brigade and in the British Government, they fully accept that others have different views on this one.

As far as I'm concerned, the opinions and behaviour of the Celtic nations in regard to the Olympics and Team GB are a nonsense. They've been re-assured time and time again that it won't threaten their independent status in regular international football. If FIFA wanted to do that, then the Scottish and Irish leagues would need to be swallowed up into the English system. It would affect domestic club football too, on a huge administrative scale. It is never going to happen.

Let's be honest and just call the Celt nations hostility for what it is, an antagonism toward England and attitudes that are rooted in the 19th/20th century, a long gone era.

For some reason a united Great Britain mens team in football has political significance, when no one bats an eyelid about the British Lions Rugby team.

With regard to the 91Èȱ¬ Nations tournament, that is another anachronism that should never be revived. Why, after a long season, would club managers allow their top players, for example: Rooney, Gerrard, Lampard etc. to play in high tempo derbies against Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales? There is nothing to gain from these matches for the English, England are already far superior to them in the rankings, they don't play a different style that helps England prepare for international competition. They are needle matches with potential for trouble both on and off the pitch. The cost of policing them needs to be taken into account. The 91Èȱ¬ Nations was cancelled because of hooliganism and when you see the xenophobic attitudes of many Celts and the reaction they are likely to provoke, surely anyone can see the tournament has been cancelled with good reason.

The Great Britain football team is meant to represent a unifying idea in relation to sport (not politics) and sadly but not surprisingly some have the view that division, historic political conflict and petty tribalism is more important.

#19
You should write to the SFA. I'm sure you know no more about the inside working of FIFA than them :)

Hubris!

Let's be honest and just call the Celt nations hostility for what it is, an antagonism toward England and attitudes that are rooted in the 19th/20th century, a long gone era.
------
And their support for your WC bid, what should we call that?

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4. At 11:09 24th Apr 2012, crippsy14 wrote:
Alot of peoples opinions would change if team GB got to the final

Some would, after all most of the population are idiots. The fact is that Olympic football is a complete joke - I doubt most of the population could name the previous winners.
On the other hand it does fit perfectly with the modern olympic ideal. Particularly that Beckham will play, despite being in semi-retirement, on the grounds that it will be could for business. Whether he is still good enough to be in the squad is of no consequence, Britain will be able to flog plenty of replica shirts with Beckham's name on it, so that he is a shoe-in for the squad. Giggs will no doubt be selected for the same reason, plus token Scottish and Irish players in an attempt to flog a few shirts elsewhere.

As A Newcastle fan I would be very disappointed to see both Papiss and Demba play in the Olympics as it will jeopardise our chances of winning any potential Europa/Champions League qualification matches, but also If the players want to play then nobody should be allowed to deny them the opportunity to represent their nation and win an Olympic medal which is a huge honour no matter what sport you participate in. As for the tournament itself I can see Uruguay winning the tournament depending on who the over 23 players are, Godin, Suarez, Cavani and Forlan spring to mind straight away and I honestly can't see team GB getting past the group stages, would like to see a more permanent under 23's team established though, hopefully the SFA and FAW can put their pride to one side as Olympic tournaments have inspired some of the best teams and players in history.

Right, my go....

Last winners were Argentina (as they were the Olympics before as well if memory serves me correctly - but I was a student then so everything is hazy).

Does nobody else consider this six of one and half a dozen of the other? Yes, the English FA have a superiority complex, but it's also matched by the chip on the shoulders of the other home nation FA's.

Can't we all just enjoy a few games of football and get over it?

I went to this match, it was full of school kids on free tickets who were aimlessly screaming, hence the noise. The football was poor and the Coventry Council 'helpers' were useless. One sent us to the totally opposite entrance to where we should've been. I suspect there will be more free tickets handed out to schools when the event begins.

Oddly seems to be only Newcastle fans vaguely positive about the tournament rather than wingeing about the GB situation. Found out yesterday I've got tickets for Spain v Honduras and Japan v Morocco, which aside from the disappointment of not getting Senegal looks fantastic. I'll be particularly interested to see which over 23's Spain send with the Euros at the same time, maybe they'll give us Xisco and Luque?

Yes, its an U23 competition in effect, and sits in the shadow (from a European perspective) of Euro 2012, but for £20 to watch two games of football I'd say its worth watching as a football fan. Who won it last time? Argentina, just like the time before. Who played in those teams? Messi, Aguero, Di Maria, Tevez, Mascherano (both times), Coloccini, Heinze. This time you've got Spain and Switzerland, Brazil and Uruguay, and god knows who else coming from the youth teams of Japan etc.

Looking forward to it, and definitely considering tickets for the GB v Brazil warmup at Middlesbrough too.

If there are still wranglings about selection from the individual UK nations, England should make the Olympics our priority this summer by picking the best U23s we can, regardless of whether they'd make the Euro squad, add in Rooney because he's integral to Englands next couple of tournamnets and as he will miss the first 2 matches of the Euros anyway.
Then we can get a group who should be pretty much Englands first choice team from the next Euros playing together gaining experience as a team in a major championship, in the same way many other nations view underage tournaments, instead of how we seem to view them, as it appears we never take them too seriously.
If however, the individual FAs can put their differences aside, then we should pick the best UK squad we can, regardless of whether this means there will only be a few non English players, there is simply no point in picking the squad based on quotas from each country ie. the same amount of players from England, Scotland, Wales and N.I.

I suspect this whole GB/Olympic football hype will end up falling flat.

If England fail at the Euros (which is highly likely) most English fans will want to forget about football (especially international football) for the remainder of the summer. Add to that the fact that most Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish fans seem to be, at best uninterested, and at worst irritated by it all.

Those who genuinely enjoy the Olympics will also end up irritated by the inevitable fact that the British media will, in typically annoying fashion, take the spotlight away from those who have trained years for London 2012 and give it to footballers.

To be honest, Paul, I'd love to comment on who should be picked for a GB olympic team, but given the uncertainty over whether the best team can even be fielded (Bale is probably the best player in GB at the moment, but will he play?) I'm not sure there's any point. If players have to be picked according to where they're from rather than on merit, I'm not sure I could even name the Northern Irish players who should make the squad.

Maybe you could post a team and we could start from there?

Hi Paul - I understand that you don't want to concentrate on the "political" side of the Team GB argument and you are entitled to your point of view but I'm afraid that this is the attitude that helps to infuriate the Scots and others. I realise that you might not be English but it is the condescending and arrogant attitudes of the English media and English FA that are so annoying. Plenty of suggestions were put forward in order to try and avoid the situation we have found ourselves in but none of them suited the priorities of the Olympic Committee or the English FA. I love my football but I have no interest whatsoever in a football competition that Great Britain have chosen to ignore for decades but have suddenly decided is an important competition this summer. Call me a cynic but is it just a coincidence that this Olympics is in London and the next one is in Brazil and suddenly the FA think Olympic Football is a good idea? This is probably the first time in my life that I have actually agreed with a decision made by the SFA.

in my opinion this just got to a new level of weirdness, the organization of the game was just awful, it was the worst experience i ever had at a football game, i think fifa should pay more attention to the organization of the game...

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